Now that's a new one on me. I've never met a professional drum tuner (outside of the numerous pro techs that I know, & half of them are extremely biased towards tuning methods that only really work in major venues).

Professional means that he advertises and charges for his services. He wasn't completely full of BS because he did solve some issues but, was he really good? How would I know?

I did all I could on my own, then hired someone to help and I still don't love it.

just weren't addressed in the OP. And if we're really gonna be serious about discussing this, then they should at least be included at some point. Because they're as valid as any other point raised here........especially to the guy who loves playing out on his e-kit.

I don't know if you've heard of the band, but there's a rock group from Canada called Rush, and their drummer plays e-kit on a number of the band's songs. Somehow he makes them sound very good.

All of the "let it be" arguments aside, this quote I found a bit funny. Also the one about the guy playing for Cher. That's cool that people either have electronics incorporated into their kits or being used as eKits outright. But the difference here is that Mr. Peart chooses to use electronics on a few songs. He has the option of playing acoustic drums. For most of us, the argument becomes a 'either or' proposition because nobody I know slugging it out in clubs or at weddings will be carrying both, and they're certainly not going to be carrying around their own PA for those times when they decide they want to use their electronics for the few songs in their sets. For what we get paid on a casual it wouldn't be worth it, right?

So I get the point of this poster, but it's still not a valid argument.

And railing on Larry doesn't seem that fair, either. As Larry explains it, the gentleman he was talking to had an argument for everything he was against. I'm sure many of us had gotten into those kinds of conversations before on a number of things. And people get defensive on both sides, it's like arguing politics or religion. I guess in the future if you find yourself getting into that kind of argumentative conversation again, just recognize it for what it is and let it go. It does kind of bug me still though. It's like meeting someone who thinks they've seen the light on something and they get totally evangelical about it. That's cool - those people have found a new toy to play with and will argue for it ad nauseum. I just choose not to argue back these days.

Unless the people who swear by their V-Drums are making money doing it, they do eventually find themselves swinging back to the acoustics. Have you guys seen the prices on replacement mesh heads? Or how about when one of those little cone pickups dies in a pad? That is not a cheap and easy fix, and I think when I had a dead TD-10 snare pad, Roland (who is rather close by to me in Los Angeles) wanted to charge me $120 to replace it. I can imagine someone who gigs regularly with their V's and doesn't live close to a big service center. What do you do when a pad dies? Just buy a new one online and hope you get it before the next gig? Heaven forbid your sound module starts acting up during a show and you have no backup. These situations seem absolutely insane to me - which explains why the guys using V-Drums have acoustic kits to play as well.

And I've been there in my small way back in the 80s when I played an Octapad alot. I had spares of everything, and then I realized I was carrying around as much as a regular acoustic kit, and only using half of it because the other half were spares waiting for something to break. It just became this stressful thing that really taxed my will to live on a gig in the 80s and 90s. I'm positive once our eKit friends experience this kind of unnecessary stress, the tunes they sing will change ;)

I wasn't arguing with the E kit guy, I was trying to see it from his POV, but I did express my doubts and he nicely said the reasons he doubted my doubts. Like I said, he was trying to convince me and he did a very good job of that.

I don't feel railed against here, sometimes more is read into words than are intended by the writer. I did imply some are lazy and for that I expected to catch a little heat. Nothing wrong there, I am not out to be politically correct to everyone.
Like I don't think I made any statements that he is stupid/dumb/sucky for liking E drums. I did say they're not for me, but again, I don't want to see them go away, because they make sense for a lot of people in a lot of situations.

I do appreciate the backup, but really, it's all cool. I like a good heated debate. Thick skin has always served me well lol.

__________________
The best way to do art, is to dispense with good and bad...and just get on with it.

All of the above are fully appropriate for creation of good music, yet if you want to choose one side of the aisle or the other that's just fine. But there's no reason to disparage those who have chosen the other side.

Or both sides, for that matter.

__________________
The more I learn about drums, the better I do my job.

The idea of having a heated discussion about whether the discussion is heated or not appeals to me somehow ...

Apart from "live & let live", my first thought was that, as an analogy, you can't compare a piano and organ. But organs aren't used as piano replacements, so a better analogy would be a weighted keyboard with piano patch.

Naturally electric grands and other piano replacement keyboards became popular because the logistics of lugging an upright or grand piano are even worse than those involved in lugging an acoustic kit.

No one would argue that electric grands are as good as acoustic pianos, but there's not much choice most of the time. Given the increasing challenges in terms of noise complaints and space restrictions, I can see an increasingly expanded role for e-kits - although that trend may well be checked by drum machines anyway.

Acoustic pianos and drums will always be more nuanced instruments but those nuances will be completely lost in an awful lot of pop and rock music. Let's face it, there's a fair bit of music out there that's almost entirely nuance-free. In that case, why not take the road of least resistance?

I want to just throw my 2 cents in here, I have this odd habit of ending a discussion. Once I chime in the posts stop. We'll see if my skills are still good.

Regarding the electric guitar/bass/piano argument. These instruments, in their electric form, have been around much longer than the electric drumkit. Let's not forget that the A-drumkit as we know it is less than 100 years old.

As former guitar player I can confidently say that there is less difference between and electric/acoustic guitars and e/a kits. The electric drumkit produces a completely programed sound, if you hit it harder/softer the sound will be louder/softer. I am still able to shape the sound of an electric guitar by alternating the construction/electronics and the type of amp I plug into. On an acoustic kit one need only switch settings and get the same results. Sure they make technology for people to plug directly into the achieve the same results but there are still purists that turn their nose up at it.

What I would love to see is a smaller acoustic kit with individual microphones that with tone adjustments that could be shaped by the player. I'll bet you could get a really big sound out of a 14x10 bass drum with the right heads/tuning and an internal mic. The real problem for such development wouldn't be making it though. It would be this generation of conservative drummers that would be very reluctant to accept something new.

I see it now, sell it on it's light weight and control over your own sound yet it still responds like an acoustic instrument because it is an acoustic instrument.

Edit: New Tricks, you paid that hack to come tune your drums!? I've been seeing his ads on CL for quite a while. I would have come over and tuned them for some beers.

I've never said, "Oh cool, the drummer is using an E kit. It's always, Oh crap, the drummer is using an E kit. Let's go see a different band.
If that makes me an elitist...so be it. You can't please everybody. The best you can do is be true to yourself, and damn the torpedos.

That may be a valid point to a professional drummer such as yourself Larry but it's made in the wrong context.
You personally may want to leave the venue when you see an e-kit because you expect/ demand the high quality sounds you can only achieve using a properly tuned A-kit.
But the average punter doesn't give a toss about the quality of the drummers rimshots (or any other nuance) they just want to hear a decent drum sound which conveys the music.
In this context e-drums fulfil their role perfectly. The e-kit (from a gigging point of view) is there to cater to the masses and no, the sound alone probably won't inspire other drummers.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bo Eder

Have you guys seen the prices on replacement mesh heads? Or how about when one of those little cone pickups dies in a pad? That is not a cheap and easy fix, and I think when I had a dead TD-10 snare pad, Roland (who is rather close by to me in Los Angeles) wanted to charge me $120 to replace it. I can imagine someone who gigs regularly with their V's and doesn't live close to a big service center. What do you do when a pad dies? Just buy a new one online and hope you get it before the next gig? Heaven forbid your sound module starts acting up during a show and you have no backup. These situations seem absolutely insane to me - which explains why the guys using V-Drums have acoustic kits to play as well.

It just became this stressful thing that really taxed my will to live on a gig in the 80s and 90s. I'm positive once our eKit friends experience this kind of unnecessary stress, the tunes they sing will change ;)

Bo, you seem to be under the false impression that Roland is the only game in town when nothing could be further from the truth. There are just so many cheaper options out there these days whether it be mesh heads, cones, triggers or whatever (and no, you don't have to go running to Uncle Roland every time something breaks).
You said it yourself in the last sentence- but things have changed in the e-drumming world quite a bit since the 80's/ 90's.
Correct me if I'm wrong but the majority of your posts (re: e-drums and their shortcomings) would indeed be made by someone who last played them in the 90's, then lost interest and never kept up with current technology.

Bo, you seem to be under the false impression that Roland is the only game in town when nothing could be further from the truth. There are just so many cheaper options out there these days whether it be mesh heads, cones, triggers or whatever (and no, you don't have to go running to Uncle Roland every time something breaks).
You said it yourself in the last sentence- but things have changed in the e-drumming world quite a bit since the 80's/ 90's.
Correct me if I'm wrong but the majority of your posts (re: e-drums and their shortcomings) would indeed be made by someone who last played them in the 90's, then lost interest and never kept up with current technology.

You're probably right. However, do know I've owned and played the Roland V-Drum TD-10 kit up til two years ago, and I still fumble around on the Zendrum (which I've always played since 1998). If it sounds like I've lost interest it's probably because I've been pursuing playing actual drums, which for a guy like me - who's dealt with every technological headache associated with playing these things live - has just been heaven lately. So you'll forgive me, but after all this time dealing with eKits and alternative modes of playing, everything I say about them is going to sound like shortcomings. Now if I never played them live or dealt with them, or even owned them, then I shouldn't talk. But I have.

I'm the embodiment of that phrase Buddy Rich said in his first Modern Drummer interview, when he was asked about drummers who did 'tricks' during a show, or used roto-toms, etc.,..., he said (and I paraphrase) "When you're done with the trick, you're gonna go right back to what you were doing, so why do it in the first place? Why not just get to it?" Meaning the actual playing of real drums. So I'm getting to it, and it's a happy place to be in. When people call me for electronic stuff, I give them names and numbers of others that are into that.

Now, other than Yamaha, who are you talking about being the other games in town? I'm sure they're out there and I'm sure I've never heard of them. But when it comes to the support game when something breaks or needs to be repaired, I think Yamaha and Roland are the only two in the game that can handle that kind of support. Alesis has been an enigma since the beginning. Who else is there? I'd go looking but the fact that I don't hear about other companies doing this (with the right kind of support) from other players tells me something, no?

Now, other than Yamaha, who are you talking about being the other games in town? I'm sure they're out there and I'm sure I've never heard of them. But when it comes to the support game when something breaks or needs to be repaired, I think Yamaha and Roland are the only two in the game that can handle that kind of support. Alesis has been an enigma since the beginning. Who else is there? I'd go looking but the fact that I don't hear about other companies doing this (with the right kind of support) from other players tells me something, no?

Well as far as modules go you've already named 3 of the "Big 4" (Roland, Yamaha and Alesis) but the other one would be 2Box.
I've heard of life long Roland owners singing their praises and making the switch so if any company was going to knock Roland off it's perch it would probably be them.
As for support, obviously if something breaks sometimes you have no choice but to send it back to the company from whence it came. However, 9 times out of 10 I've found a solution to any e-drums problem by checking out the V-drums forum and fixing it myself.
You mentioned how expensive it was to replace mesh heads. If you were to pay Roland's extortionist prices, yeah you'd be up for some cash. But with companies like 682Drums, Z-Ed, Billy Blast,etc- all much cheaper alternatives than Roland and just as good IMO.
Same goes for triggers. $120 for Roland to replace a foam cone with a piezo on the bottom?? Highway robbery! Thankfully you could use Ddrum triggers, Quartz percussion harnesses or make them yourself if you're that way inclined.
Like I said, heaps of options and many more I haven't mentioned.

Take the ride cymbal for instance, there are so many different ways it can be played, so many different sounds that can come out of it. Compare it to the rubber piece that is supposed to represent that cymbal.

I purchased a fairly cheap E Kit (Alesis) when I got back into drumming. The next thing I purchased when we started gigging was an old Sonor acoustic kit. It was a quarter the price (only cost me £100) but what do I prefer playing? Of course, the Sonor.

However, my E Kit is probably the most valuable investment I ever made because it facilitated practicing at home for me. And after a decade out of music, the one thing I have had to do on joining a band which play faster punk/pop is to practice.

On a practical level E Kits are so useful. The key element of drumming I would imagine is 'timing'. Who can argue on the validity of using a set of E Drums to hone ones timing. Does it matter that they don't sound like a top of the range Ludwig...no. Does it hell. Do they help improve on your timing and technique...of course they do.

I love both instruments...they both have completely different applications for me. I'd be lost without either.

I have the E Kit setup as identically to my acoustics as possible when practicing. And practice takes the form of a warm up then hell I just play along to as varied a set of tunes as possible, usually with speed being the common denominator.

The drums themselves...feelwise I don't see the chasmic difference that some do. Perhaps that's because I'm only a pretty simple amateur drummer playing fairly simple music. The cymbals on the Ekit leave a lot to be desired. However, I would say that I'd rather hit the cymbal from an E Kit than a cheap, bottom line cymbal. You can do more with a cheap rubber thing present on an Alesis E Kit, than with an old Paiste 101 IMHO.

Again, I dig both kits...I wish I could afford to buy more expensive, better kits on both planes

You're probably right. However, do know I've owned and played the Roland V-Drum TD-10 kit up til two years ago, and I still fumble around on the Zendrum (which I've always played since 1998). If it sounds like I've lost interest it's probably because I've been pursuing playing actual drums, which for a guy like me - who's dealt with every technological headache associated with playing these things live - has just been heaven lately. So you'll forgive me, but after all this time dealing with eKits and alternative modes of playing, everything I say about them is going to sound like shortcomings. Now if I never played them live or dealt with them, or even owned them, then I shouldn't talk. But I have.

I'm the embodiment of that phrase Buddy Rich said in his first Modern Drummer interview, when he was asked about drummers who did 'tricks' during a show, or used roto-toms, etc.,..., he said (and I paraphrase) "When you're done with the trick, you're gonna go right back to what you were doing, so why do it in the first place? Why not just get to it?" Meaning the actual playing of real drums. So I'm getting to it, and it's a happy place to be in. When people call me for electronic stuff, I give them names and numbers of others that are into that.

Now, other than Yamaha, who are you talking about being the other games in town? I'm sure they're out there and I'm sure I've never heard of them. But when it comes to the support game when something breaks or needs to be repaired, I think Yamaha and Roland are the only two in the game that can handle that kind of support. Alesis has been an enigma since the beginning. Who else is there? I'd go looking but the fact that I don't hear about other companies doing this (with the right kind of support) from other players tells me something, no?

You're right about Alesis...

When I had a drum head bust on me some time back...the only way I was able to replace it was by buying a full replacement drum on Ebay. It still only cost me the price of a half decent splash cymbal but even so, would have been nice JUST to replace the mylar head.

I want to just throw my 2 cents in here, I have this odd habit of ending a discussion. Once I chime in the posts stop. We'll see if my skills are still good.

Regarding the electric guitar/bass/piano argument. These instruments, in their electric form, have been around much longer than the electric drumkit. Let's not forget that the A-drumkit as we know it is less than 100 years old.

As former guitar player I can confidently say that there is less difference between and electric/acoustic guitars and e/a kits. The electric drumkit produces a completely programed sound, if you hit it harder/softer the sound will be louder/softer. I am still able to shape the sound of an electric guitar by alternating the construction/electronics and the type of amp I plug into. On an acoustic kit one need only switch settings and get the same results. Sure they make technology for people to plug directly into the achieve the same results but there are still purists that turn their nose up at it.

What I would love to see is a smaller acoustic kit with individual microphones that with tone adjustments that could be shaped by the player. I'll bet you could get a really big sound out of a 14x10 bass drum with the right heads/tuning and an internal mic. The real problem for such development wouldn't be making it though. It would be this generation of conservative drummers that would be very reluctant to accept something new.

I see it now, sell it on it's light weight and control over your own sound yet it still responds like an acoustic instrument because it is an acoustic instrument.

Edit: New Tricks, you paid that hack to come tune your drums!? I've been seeing his ads on CL for quite a while. I would have come over and tuned them for some beers.

I don't understand...

I can pick a drum setting on my E Drums and THEN change all the micro-settings on it also...I can tune it up, down, change the sustain, change the attack....the lot.

To suggest that you can only 'pick a module and go with that' isn't correct (if that's what you're saying).

And you state that they produce a programmed sound...again I'm not sure about that. I believe the sounds on my Alesis are recorded from the ACTUAL drums they are simulating, rather than being programmed.

I play amateur pop/rock/blues and when we play out, it is in in very small venues and the sound is as or more important than my/our abilities.

Right now, my ONLY concern is that we play with a good mix, in tempo and sing on key. The E kit solves a LOT of sound issues.

You mentioned the dynamics of your ride cymbal and it is a good example. I only use my ride in maybe 20% of my play. I am more of a HH guy. When I do use it, it is straight 1/8 notes. In the music I choose to play, the way I choose to play it, the dynamics of the ride cymbal are of no importance. I don't pick music apart and 99% of the people I play for do not either.

When the day comes when someone important tells me that they liked the music, but I should have a more dynamic ride, I will start to focus more on the details.

In my simple genre, it's bass and snare to keep tempo and simple fills and crashes between segments. I think that is what most people hear, if they are even paying attention to the drums. I'm a drummer, not a front man.

The E kick/snare/toms sound good to me so I'm confident they sound good to the general public. The cymbals are.........close enough :)

I have read over and over how drummers are in love with the sound of their A kits and I have tried and tried to achieve this feeling without success. I would love to sit at someone's "perfect" kit just to see if it is the kit or my expectations. My A's just don't sound good to me. I even had them professionally tuned. I learned a lot from it and they do sound better, but I'm hardly in love with them.

Like I said, for what I do, the E's are much better. The only drawback is some people's perception which, fortunately, I can easily disregard.

As far as being a good drummer? I am making progress but I wouldn't consider myself a good drummer. I am a competent drummer, a good musician and a superior human being :)

..

Very well argues and put.
I used my E kit the first time we gigged out...the only reason why I then purchased an A kit is because the E kit just didn't look right on stage backing up a four piece band.
But it certainly sounded the part...judging by some of the comments from those who watched.
The sound engineers were particularly impressed by it

I've always seen E-Kits as something that is more a decision of practicality than one of love. As some people around here know, I'm a big fan of electronic approaches to music and I play with drum machines (and write my own sequencing software) and rhythm is one particular approach that is served well by electronics.

Electronic drum kits (and I own one) have always felt like a compromise to me. You get the potential soundscape that electronics provide but without the 'rigidity' that can be a big factor in the way electronic music is produced. E-kits are certainly valid as instruments but I like to treat them as a separate category of instrument, rather than trying to use them to replace acoustic kits. As a replacement, they're close to good enough for most people but I've never been convinced by electronic cymbals or snares. In a mix with a full band going, they sound fine - but on their own? No thanks.

If we treat the E-Kit as a separate instrument though, things get much more interesting. Taking the guts of the kit and using it outside of the module with a laptop you can do remarkable things. It would be relatively trivial to set up a guitarists pedalboard in software and change the settings mid-song using an E-Kit - provided they were happy with software solutions (and some of them are very, very good now). Another idea could be to trigger time-critical sound effects with one pad and then adjust the settings using another pad - you could feed an acoustic snare into software, whack on a delay and pan it or adjust the feedback or repeats using MIDI note values or velocity values. These are really good, fun things to do that can provide some superb results if you have the patience to set it up.

The beauty of it is the MIDI protocol. Anything you can in MIDI you can manipulate with an electronic drum kit - especially if it has 'note off' in the module. MIDI can do a Hell of a lot!

So if we treat E-Kits like 'real' drum kits, for me they fall a bit short, although they're 'good enough' for most Rock/Pop/Metal situations. They fall down in Jazz because of the cymbal zoning and snare zoning issues and the lack of really fine nuance that you need in Jazz. If you take a totally different approach to music in general, they can be very rewarding indeed. It just requires a bit of MIDI knowledge!

Part of my love of drums comes from massive kick drums that take up a lot of space

Have to agree there, NOTHING beats the feel of a 24" kick, I've played a roland before, kit was around $1,000 was surprised by how good it was but i prefer acoustics, both types of kit are good for different reasons

Edit: New Tricks, you paid that hack to come tune your drums!? I've been seeing his ads on CL for quite a while. I would have come over and tuned them for some beers.

I was desperate :)

I keep reading how awesome A kits are and mine was just not doing it for me.

He did teach me that the snare buzz was coming from the toms, not the snare itself. That insight was worth half the $65 . It made perfect sense when I thought about it and he completely eliminated it on all but one tom.

It's still not doing it for me so, when you are thirsty, come on down to Central Phoenix.

He did teach me that the snare buzz was coming from the toms, not the snare itself. That insight was worth half the $65 . It made perfect sense when I thought about it and he completely eliminated it on all but one tom.

If snare buzz is bothering you that much, then you definitely haven't fallen in love with the sound of drums.

Well as far as modules go you've already named 3 of the "Big 4" (Roland, Yamaha and Alesis) but the other one would be 2Box.
I've heard of life long Roland owners singing their praises and making the switch so if any company was going to knock Roland off it's perch it would probably be them.
As for support, obviously if something breaks sometimes you have no choice but to send it back to the company from whence it came. However, 9 times out of 10 I've found a solution to any e-drums problem by checking out the V-drums forum and fixing it myself.
You mentioned how expensive it was to replace mesh heads. If you were to pay Roland's extortionist prices, yeah you'd be up for some cash. But with companies like 682Drums, Z-Ed, Billy Blast,etc- all much cheaper alternatives than Roland and just as good IMO.
Same goes for triggers. $120 for Roland to replace a foam cone with a piezo on the bottom?? Highway robbery! Thankfully you could use Ddrum triggers, Quartz percussion harnesses or make them yourself if you're that way inclined.
Like I said, heaps of options and many more I haven't mentioned.

Would Pearl be on that list as well? Isn't their acoustic drum/eKit making as big a splash as they'd like?

So, you see, after all these years of playing, I must be totally passionless about the electric thing. I used to effect my own repairs on the ancient octapads back in the day and (back then) bugging technicians in person (since there wasn't really an internet at the time) for advice on what to do and I guess the one good thing about all of that is I got mad soldering skills that I use to this day on my regular audio engineer job. But somewhere along the line I added up all the time, money, and effort put into this part-time electronic drumming business and decided to stop the madness. Again, this gets back to the "why don't I just get to it" passion of acoustic drumming. I had certainly wasted years of time I could've spent practicing my acoustic craft, which is what everyone really wants anyway. So I've done that (TD-10 and Zendrum notwithstanding). Maintaining an acoustic kit is child's play next to making sure the eKit is ready to take on the nightly bashing of a busy schedule.

It's like the questions we get here all the time of folks asking "what are good intermediate cymbals because I can't afford Zildjians?" Well, sooner or later you realize you're gonna get the Zildjians (or any other pro-line cymbals) because there's really no way of getting good acoustic sounds without making the investment in the right stuff. Ekits are like that. I think people get them because of the promise of replicating an acoustic kit in a band situation and really, it's only good for maybe 40% of those situations. That other 60% is eventually going to pull you back to where you started from.

Players like Neil Peart and Omar Hakim get to have the best of both worlds when they go out to play. Bill Bruford mixed the two as well. The only person that was brave enough to use a V-Drum kit exclusively for one tour was Pat Mastellotto with King Crimson after Bill Bruford and Tony Levin left the band - and then he only did that for one tour - and I thought it was obvious why because it didn't sound as good as the real thing (as evidenced in the next tour).

Have both, love both. Each has its uses. For playing live, I'm back to primarily using the A-kit. But it was an E-kit that got me back into drumming after a hiatus, and my current much-tweeked E-kit makes it possible for me to practice while preserving the peace. And it is invaluable in the studio, especially when collaborating with other songwriters. The E-kit is always set up and patched up to my rig, and I can track to MIDI and send off the performance to a collaborator- who can then use whatever module or VST instrument they might like to impose whatever sounds they wish upon my performance.

Roland is certainly not the only game in town when it comes to E-kits. I'm a Hart Dynamics user for mesh-head pads, and their dual-zone brass ride is much closer to a real ride than any other electronic cymbal I've tried. Their Pro snare is also very, very nice. I use a Roland TD20 and and Alesis DM5, and also have BFD and DFH for VST sound engines. There are a lot of ways to skin that cat.

When I want my A-kit, I want it: and don't mind humping it around. When I want my E-kit, I want it: and don't mind the funny looks. Both are just tools- but sometimes, it is really convenient to have a volume knob...

I've also got an Alesis mylar-head kit that I used a few times to rehearse with a band. It is listed on Craigslist and has attracted zero attention: those are too much like a practice pad kit, for sure. I don't know if I'm ever gonna be able to unload that thing. But therein lies a lesson: If I only used that one, or one of the rubber-pad kits, I'd have an altogether different opinion of E-kits.

Oh, and don't forget Johnny "Vatos" Hernandez with Oingo Boingo. There's another fine pro who made use of an E-kit while touring- that was a big part of their sound...

Would Pearl be on that list as well? Isn't their acoustic drum/eKit making as big a splash as they'd like?

So, you see, after all these years of playing, I must be totally passionless about the electric thing. I used to effect my own repairs on the ancient octapads back in the day and (back then) bugging technicians in person (since there wasn't really an internet at the time) for advice on what to do and I guess the one good thing about all of that is I got mad soldering skills that I use to this day on my regular audio engineer job. But somewhere along the line I added up all the time, money, and effort put into this part-time electronic drumming business and decided to stop the madness. Again, this gets back to the "why don't I just get to it" passion of acoustic drumming. I had certainly wasted years of time I could've spent practicing my acoustic craft, which is what everyone really wants anyway. So I've done that (TD-10 and Zendrum notwithstanding). Maintaining an acoustic kit is child's play next to making sure the eKit is ready to take on the nightly bashing of a busy schedule.

The Pearl E-Pro is most definitely NOT on the list! : )
I've actually had the (dis)pleasure of having a go on one of these and was underwhelmed to say the least. Their Redbox module produces the crappiest, tinniest sounds I've ever heard and their Tru-Trac heads are like hitting a foam mattress (although that's probably because I'm used to the extra "bounciness" of mesh heads).
Their major selling point at the time was "Wow, you can take off the Tru-Trac heads, put on mylar heads and use it as an A-kit"! Well, whoopdi-doo- you can convert any A-kit into and e-kit with mesh heads and a few triggers (and you get to choose any kit you like).
I completely understand your frustrations with e-kits (God knows we all have them) and I know you said you were playing them up until 2 years ago.
The point I was trying to make is that you seem to be a tad "bitter and twisted" about your e-drumming experiences when they were still in their relative infancy and this may have skewed your judgement of present day e-kits.
Sure, many of the same short-comings are still there but with the current technology I truly believe e-kits are not as cumbersome as you may think.

I would love to hear Larry's review of an e-kit. Any chance you could play one at a music store?

I have a Yamaha DTX kit and love it for pracitce, built in songs that you can turn the drums on and off in, built in met, 30 different kits, volume knob and many other reasons. Its not an a kit though.

Same mechanical motions used but outcome is much less personalized.

I have a good friend who can play the most complicated, syncopated beats at any tempo at about the volume level of the average conversation and seeing that makes me want to be that good on my a kit. Dont think you could develop that if you just played an e kit.

The Pearl E-Pro is most definitely NOT on the list! : )
I've actually had the (dis)pleasure of having a go on one of these and was underwhelmed to say the least. Their Redbox module produces the crappiest, tinniest sounds I've ever heard and their Tru-Trac heads are like hitting a foam mattress (although that's probably because I'm used to the extra "bounciness" of mesh heads).
Their major selling point at the time was "Wow, you can take off the Tru-Trac heads, put on mylar heads and use it as an A-kit"! Well, whoopdi-doo- you can convert any A-kit into and e-kit with mesh heads and a few triggers (and you get to choose any kit you like).
I completely understand your frustrations with e-kits (God knows we all have them) and I know you said you were playing them up until 2 years ago.
The point I was trying to make is that you seem to be a tad "bitter and twisted" about your e-drumming experiences when they were still in their relative infancy and this may have skewed your judgement of present day e-kits.
Sure, many of the same short-comings are still there but with the current technology I truly believe e-kits are not as cumbersome as you may think.

Well, if it's not electricity dealing with the audio rig, I tend to be bitter and twisted around drums having to be wired and powered up. Hitting an eKit harder and harder but you get nothing back, that twists me up too. I'm just getting simpler in my old age ;)

I would love to hear Larry's review of an e-kit. Any chance you could play one at a music store?

I think E kits are great for practice purposes, where volume consideration is a prime consideration. More power to the people who use them for this purpose. If I had a choice between not practicing at home, or practicing on an E kit, I would go E for sure. I don't have that limitation where I live. So no E kits for me.
Reviewing an E kit at a music store....waste of time IMO. Let me review an E kit at a gig. THAT'S where my problem lies with E kits. I just don't like the sounds they make. They are good enough for practice, but for a gig? Give me real drums. I don't want perfect tones. I hear the guys playing the E drums in the music stores. It never draws me in, because half the skill is making a good tone. I naturally dismiss E tones because they are not real, they are artificial. If you hold your stick tight and tense, the A drum will pick up on that. If you hold your sticks loose and relaxed, your A drum will reflect that too. That's a drummers touch. Do E kits reflect how tight your stick is held? I'm thinking no. That's just one tiny aspect among many others.

I'm guessing that yes I could adapt quick enough with an E kit at a gig, and I could find a way to make it work....good enough. Good enough isn't the way I operate, I like to go the extra mile, heck an extra 10 miles. Plus now, geez, I have to set up some kind of monitoring system to hear myself. Negates any benefit right there. And cymbal tones are just a major portion of my playing. Major. I'm pretty sure I would have big, no HUGE issues with rubber cymbals and hi hats. And perfect drum tones are too artificial for me. It's the imperfections in tone that make drums sound human. I want music to sound human, not cyborg.

__________________
The best way to do art, is to dispense with good and bad...and just get on with it.